1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to medicine dosages, and more particularly, to techniques for labeling syringes to assist in providing appropriate dosages of medicine during emergencies.
2. Description of the Related Art
Physicians conventionally base drug dosages on a patient""s weight. When the physician does not know the weight, the physician bases the dose on an estimate, or best guess, of the weight. The possibility that the doctor will misjudge weight increases during emergency situations. Misjudging the patient""s weight leads to giving the incorrect dose of medicine. Therefore, it is desirable to have a more objective and easily obtainable measurement of a patient to be used to determine the correct dose of medicine.
Dr. James B. Broselow has invented a method of utilizing an objective and easily obtainable measurement to determine drug dose. As described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,713,888 to Broselow entitled MEASURING TAPE FOR DIRECTLY DETERMINING PHYSICAL TREATMENT AND PHYSIOLOGICAL VALUES, U.S. Pat. No. 4,823,469 to Broselow entitled MEASURING TAPE FOR DIRECTLY DETERMINING PHYSICAL TREATMENT AND PHYSIOLOGICAL VALUES AND PROCEDURES, and U.S. Pat No. 5,010,656 to Broselow entitled THERAPEUTIC APPARATUS, the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference, Dr. Broselow has developed a technique in which drug dosages are correlated to a patient""s length, which is readily measurable. It is recommended that the Broselow patents be read in their entirety to fully appreciate the method and teachings disclosed therein.
More particularly, and referring now to FIGS. 1-3, a drug dose may be determined by reference to a patient""s length in the following way. Tape 10 is used by a physician to measure a patient""s length. Tape 10 includes an enclosure 12 into which tape 10 can be retracted and a pull tab 14. Rather then containing length measurements in inches, centimeters, or the like, tape 10 is segmented into color range indicia 2, 4, 6, 8, etc. For purposes of example only, color range 2 may be red, color range 4 green, color range 6 yellow, and color range 8 blue. It can readily be appreciated, however, that other color or marking schemes may be used. Moreover, tape 10 may contain length measurements in inches, centimeters, or the like and also include indicia 2, 4, 6, 8, etc.
FIG. 2 illustrates a cup 20 like that disclosed by Dr. Broselow in U.S. Pat. No. 5,010,656 (FIG. 7 and related description therein), from which medicine may be dispensed. Cup 20 is marked with a series of lines 22, 24, 26, 28, etc. In this example, lines 22, 24, 26, and 28 of cup 20 correspond to color range indicia 2, 4, 6, and 8 of tape 10, with indicia 22 red, indicia 24 green, indicia 26 yellow, and indicia 28 blue.
Referring now to FIG. 3, an operator 32 (for example, a nurse, physician or technician) places pull tab 14 of tape 10 at the heel 36 of a patient 34. Operator 32 moves enclosure 12 along patient 34 until enclosure 12 reaches a crown 38 of patient 34. A corresponding color range indicia on tape 10 (for example, range 4 green) which aligns with the crown 38 of patient 34, is read and noted. Operator 32 then dispenses medicine to patient 34 by filling cup 20 with medicine until the top surface of the medicine is aligned with the line on cup 20 which corresponds to the noted color range on tape 10. In this example, operator 32 fills cup 20 to green line 24, and the patient then drinks the medicine dose from cup 20. Similarly, red range indicia 2 on tape 10 matches red line 22 on cup 20, etc. In this way, the length of patient 34 is directly correlated to a volumetric dose of a medicine dispensed from a cup. As is more fully described in the Broselow patents, correlations can be made to other apparatus (e.g., tube lengths) and device settings.
It must be noted, however, that while providing indicia on cup 20 corresponding to indicia on tape 10 improves the dispensation of medicine, it greatly complicates the manufacturing process of molding cup 20. Conventional imprinting techniques may require multiple runs of the cups through the printing machines. Furthermore, inventories having different dispensers imprinted for different types of medicine may need to be maintained at a prohibitively high cost.
Of course medicines are dispensed to patients from containers other than cup 20 as described above. In particular, syringes are widely used to dispense fluids to patients. Intravenous, hypodermic and oral syringes are variously used to dispense medications and other fluids to patients. While syringes for different purposes often have different features and attachments, they typically contain a cylindrical barrel which receives and contains the medication to be dispensed and a plunger slidably mounted in the barrel. The plunger is withdrawn away from the forward end of the barrel to draw medicine into the barrel and pushed towards the forward end of the barrel to dispense medicine from the barrel out of the tip of the syringe.
Syringes often have volumetric markings on the barrel (e.g. ounce or cubic centimeter (cc)), with such markings typically imprinted in a single color, often black, during a single pass in the manufacturing process. It can readily be appreciated that imprinting even a single color on conventional syringes during the manufacturing process is naturally complicated by the 3-dimensional nature of the syringe, the cylindrical shape of the barrel, and volumetric variations in barrel capacity. When multiple imprinting is contemplated, consistent registration of lines on a syringe may be difficult to monitor and may require multiple quality control checks to ensure accuracy of the volumes indicated by all of the different marks. Accordingly, it is postulated that implementation of the color/dose correlation system disclosed in the Broselow patents with syringes by multiple color imprinting techniques may well be discouraged by prohibitively high manufacturing costs.
It is a principal object of the present invention to provide a means of placing a removable and reusable drug dose marking on a specific size standard syringe filled or to be filled with a known medication.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide such a removable and reusable drug dose marking means so that a specific patient regimen for a drug can be followed without requiring customized syringes for the patient.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide such a removable and reusable drug dose marking means without the necessity for customizing syringes for different doses and strengths of different medications at the time the syringes are produced.
The present invention includes a removable and reusable sleeve adapted for mounting on the barrel of a syringe from which a dose of medication is to be dispensed to a patient. The syringe includes a barrel adapted for receiving the medication and a plunger adapted for drawing the medication into the barrel and dispensing the medication therefrom. The medication dose is based on a measured length or other value of the patient that corresponds to one of a plurality of coded ranges. The sleeve of the present invention contains indicia corresponding to a plurality of the coded ranges. In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, the indicia include a plurality of colored marks corresponding to a plurality of the coded ranges indicative of different doses of the medication. In another embodiment of the present invention, the sleeve contains a single black or colored mark. In yet another embodiment, the sleeve also contains alignment or positioning indicia. In still yet another embodiment, the sleeve of the present invention is color tinted to correspond to a coded range.